Even before her well-deserved breakout in THE WHOLE TOWN’S TALKING/’35 hit theaters, Jean Arthur, here on loan from Columbia to M-G-M , shows staggering comic confidence, as well as great chemistry with undervalued co-star Chester Morris, in this slightly mad, highly enjoyable genre mash-up. Or does once she finally shows up in the third reel. Before then, twenty minutes of prison drama for undercover Fed Agent Morris, posing as a convict as part of his mission to infiltrate and take down the notorious Purple Gang. (The real Purple Gang, a Jewish mob outfit in Detroit, lends nothing but their name.) Once out, Morris meets-cute with Arthur when he runs the bus she’s on into a ditch during a rainstorm. Soon, they’re off to pick up alcoholic mob doc Lionel Barrymore, needed to get a bullet out of fellow prison escapee Joseph Calleia, Purple Gangster/half-brother of Jean Arthur. Who’d thunk? After this revelation, the film doesn’t exactly soar on believability, but under director J. Walter Ruben and lenser Gregg Toland there’s relentless pace, romantic banter and enough odd plot turns & clever visual bits to keep you from thinking too hard about what’s going on. More Warners gangster pic, less posh M-G-M crime cautionary, and all the better for it if not quite first-rate.
DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: While Arthur was moving up in Hollywood, Morris was about to get downgraded, leaving M-G-M for third wheel roles and leads in B-pics. A real loss. See him at his best in an Early Talkie prison classic, THE BIG HOUSE/’30. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2019/09/the-big-house-1930.html
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Shocking to watch Lionel Barrymore playing such a hopeless drunk at the very moment younger brother John was off screen for a full year, trying (without success) to dry out. Sister Ethel also alcoholic, but largely able to control their father's curse. Lionel’s addictive nature leaned toward drugs like morphine, supplied by the studio to help him fight crippling arthritic pain.
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